Defense, Romero help lift Pintos to first win of the season

Moriarty running back Xavier Romero trying to get around a Santa Fe defender. Photo by G. Demarest.

Moriarty High School’s head football coach Joe Anaya said his team’s Aug. 31 victory over the visiting Class 5A Santa Fe Demons wasn’t pretty, but he’ll take it.

“Well, we won,” Anaya said. “It always makes it a little bit better when we win.”

Moriarty senior running back Xavier Romero—who had two touchdowns rushing—was more excited about the 20-12 victory.

“It feels phenomenal to get our first win,” Romero said, adding, “But we gotta get better.”

Anaya said he was satisfied with the Pintos’ performance but acknowledged that the team “got away with some stuff” against the Demons—alluding to mistakes that could have been costly.

“The defense played very well,” Anaya said. “Overall, we did a lot of things right, but we’ve still got some things we’ve got to fix.”

Moriarty fumbled on its opening drive and the Demons (0-2) recovered.

The Pintos coughed up the ball two other times in the first half but recovered their own fumbles.

“Yeah, every time I turned around it seemed like the ball was on the floor,” Anaya said. “We’ve got to hold onto the ball, that’s basic football.”

Moriarty also committed several penalties, including seven false starts.

The Pintos (1-1) got on the board midway through the second quarter when Pete Sandoval’s 3-yard plunge into the end zone capped a 66-yard drive.

Sandoval netted 42 yards rushing on 10 carries.

A few minutes later, after the Pintos stalled at their own 37, Moriarty’s short punt bounced into the hands of a Santa Fe defender who returned it 50 yards for a TD to trim the home team’s lead to 7-6 at halftime.

The Pintos used six plays on their first possession of the third quarter to get inside the Demons 20-yard line. But a false start penalty pushed them back 5 yards.

On the next play, Romero scampered 23 yards to the end zone for the first of his two TDs.

“I said [to the team], ‘We’ve gotta get this back, we gotta push through,’ because I was the one who committed the false start—I told them it was my bad,” Romero said. “And our team really responded.”